Young Adults' Group

Teach Us To Number Our Days

by Pastor Mark
August 20, 2026

God’s gift of life

God has given us the great blessing of life and it is up to us how we choose to use it. Yet we often take this blessing for granted. We tend to waste it on foolish and frivolous distractions. The challenge is to recognise how limited our life is. Life is indeed precious. How we use our remaining time matters to the Lord and to us.

At Morning Worship, we learnt about the circumstances Israel faced. When the ten spies gave a bad report of the Promised Land and caused the people of Israel to rebel against God by refusing to enter the land, there were serious consequences. Israel had to spend altogether 40 years in the wilderness and the ten spies were killed by a plague sent by God (Numbers 14:33–37). But Caleb and Joshua fully obeyed the Lord and remained alive (Numbers 14:38). God preserved them so they could continue to lead Israel into the Promised Land.

1. Consciousness of God

1. The problem is that we are not impacted enough concerning God and His wrath.
2. The ten spies had chosen to rebel when they disobeyed and they paid for it.
3. When Moses wrote Psalm 90, he was very conscious of the wrath of God…“For all our days have passed away in Your wrath; we finish our years like a sigh.” (Psalm 90:9)
4. God can easily consume us for our sins and iniquities.
5. It is purely by the grace and mercy of the Lord that we are not consumed.
6. Let us be that much more conscious of the Lord and His wrath.

2. Contemplation of our days

“So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12)

1. The challenge is to contemplate the time we have left in our lives.
2. Moses prayed for God to teach us to number our days wisely.
3. Our life is like a sigh…it is temporal and fleeting.
4. We would be wise to use each day with discernment and not waste our lives.
5. Let us not be distracted by shallow and vain pursuits.
6. Let us be challenged to focus on fulfilling what God wants to do in our lives.

3. Calibrate

1. Have we allowed our own waywardness and sin to get the better of us?
2. We need to recalibrate our lives wisely and properly.
3. When the people of Israel heard God’s judgment against them…to return to the wilderness, they decided presumptuously to enter the land of Canaan.
4. They did not consider their response correctly and disobeyed God again.
5. The challenge is for us to recalibrate our response correctly…by returning to the Lord.
6. Moses prayed further in his psalm that we should pray for God to show His compassion and mercy to us (Psalm 90:13–14).

 4. Continue

Wisdom teaches us to continue doing what we are meant to fulfil. God had a purpose for Moses, Caleb and Joshua, and they sought to fulfil their special roles. In the same way, God has a special purpose for each one of us…to do His work. The challenge is to continue and fulfil what the Lord has planned for us. Our prayer to God should be that He establish the work of our hands (Psalm 90:17). While we are alive and with whatever time we have left, let us be challenged to use it well and fulfil the Lord’s plan and purpose for our lives.

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